SimpleDigitalLocomotive is a Mac OS X application designed to help you control model railway locomotives via a serial port, via USB, or through Ethernet. To use the utility all you have to do is connect the model railway to your Mac computer, and SimpleDigitalLocomotive will control the locomotives using the RS.422 or RS.232 ports.

Easy to setup controller for your digital model railroad

Upon launch, SimpleDigitalLocomotive will scan for the available ports, and you must select the one you want to use. Depending on the digital controlling device you are using (Mrkl Interface, IB-1, Twin-Center, EasyControl, ECoS, CC-Schnitte, and others), SimpleDigitalLocomotive needs to use different protocols and configurations.

Making all these adjustments is fairly straightforward: most options can be accessed via drop don menus. In addition, the SimpleDigitalLocomotive documentation included in the software archive provides extensive details about how to setup SimpleDigitalLocomotive to work with your model railroad.

Keep track of all your vehicles use the switchboard to visualize the model railway

SimpleDigitalLocomotive comes with additional windows that enables you to see a list with all your vehicles, where you can store details about their types, address, used protocol, group, decoder, or symbol. In addition, you can also monitor your accessories and sensors.

Other tools include digital, delta and accessory decoder calculators, turntables, or the possibility to quickly generate statistics. Within the SimpleDigitalLocomotive application you can create multiple switchboards and so on. Some of these tools might be confusing to use because the English localization does not seem to be complete.

To conclude, SimpleDigitalLocomotive is a comprehensive software solution that can connect to your model railroad controller and help you manage your vehicles and switchboards from the comfort of your Mac. However, to correctly configure the system reading the included documentation is highly advisable.

SimpleDigitalLocomotive was reviewed by Iulia Ivan, last updated on February 18th, 2015